<\/p>
A young woman steps into a motel shower; she smiles with some relief, the warm water seemingly washing away her sins \u2013 she has stolen a lot of money, but has decided she will go home and return it tomorrow. Beyond the shower curtain the door opens and a dark figure approaches slowly before ripping back the curtain; with it comes a torrent of shrieking strings, the musicians\u2019 slashes and stabs working in unison with those of the faceless, knife-wielding maniac. When it\u2019s done, as the sounds of the cellos ebb away, so too does the woman\u2019s life.<\/p>
Marion Crane\u2019s demise at the hands of (spoiler alert) Norman Bates is one of the most famous scenes in cinema history. But this shocking moment from early in Alfred Hitchock\u2019s 1960 masterpiece, Psycho<\/em>, could have been very different. Hitchcock didn\u2019t want music in the scene, but composer Bernard Herrmann felt he knew better (as he often did) and wrote some anyway. Herrmann was almost 20 years into his film career by this point, so he had more than a sure grasp of his craft and Hitchcock was quickly convinced. They wouldn\u2019t always see eye to eye, though, famously going their separate ways just a few years later after nine legendary films together.<\/p> Herrmann\u2019s first music for the big screen was as groundbreaking as the film it was written for: Orson Welles\u2019s Citizen Kane <\/em>(1941). He had composed and conducted music for Welles\u2019s famous \u2018Mercury Theatre on Air\u2019 at CBS Radio in New York, including the now infamous 1938 War of the Worlds<\/em> episode that sent many listening Americans into a spin thinking the East Coast was under attack. <\/p>What was Herrmann’s first film score? <\/h2>